PATRIOT Francisco Gros

Jul 1, 2003

In a long career in business, finance and government in
Brazil, Francisco Gros has always stood out as a patrician and
something of a patriot in a country that tends to scorn such
values. Gros has worked as president of Aracruz Celulose, a big
paper pulp exporter, served twice as central bank president and
then headed Morgan Stanley's office in São Paulo.
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso picked Gros to run BNDES,
the national development bank, in 2000 and then moved him to
Petrobras, the national oil company, in the final year of his
presidency. Gros clearly likes basic industries. He took over
as president of Fosfertil, a fertilizer company in São
Paulo, after leaving Petrobras when...